Australian Journal of Linguistics

Vol. 20, no. 1 (2000)

Articles

Reduced relatives and apposition	Juan Carlos Acuna-Farina	5-22
Intonational downtrends in Mayali	Janet Fletcher & Nicholas Evans	23-38
Grammaticalization of Japanese verbals	Kiyoharu Ono	39-79

Book reviews

Aspect, eventuality types, and nominal reference (Hana Filip)	Simon Musgrave	81-85
Linguistic anthropology (Alessandro Duranti) and Anthropological linguistics, an introduction (William A. Foley)	Peter Sutton	85-87

Abstracts

Reduced relatives and apposition

Juan Carlos Acuna-Farina

Abstract: This paper examines McCawley's recent account (1998: 467-478) of the distinction between reduced relative clauses and several appositive structures. One of McCawley's main goals is to show that structures which are commonly 'lumped together' under the name apposition can be subdivided into two different things: namely-structures, which are canonical appositions, and reduced relatives, which, in his account, are only anaphorically linked to their hosts. Yet it is shown here, first, that McCawley's formulation of that distinction is inaccurate, since it is based on a flawed application of the criteria he himself proposes. Second, and equally importantly, it is also argued that McCawley's study fails to address a number of problems raised by his own account. Two such issues are the role of grammatical markers of apposition and the analysis of 'detached NPs'.

Intonational downtrends in Mayali

Janet Fletcher & Nicholas Evans

Abstract: Many researchers note the paucity of intonational studies of Australian languages. While some descriptive phonetic work has been carried out, most notably on Dyirbal narratives, many grammars do not include systematic descriptions of intonational variation. In this paper, intonational downtrends (declination, downstep, final lowering) and pitch range reset are examined in two varieties of Mayali (Bininj Gun-wok) - Gundjeihmi and Kundedjnjenghmi. Preliminary results of an acoustic intonational study of four texts from these dialects of Mayali show that there is evidence of systematic and non-systematic downtrends (i.e. downstep and final lowering). Mayali shows tonal space resetting across intonational phrases and a use of low boundary tones that are likely to be related to discourse factors, such as initiating new topics, and initiating or closing off discourse 'paragraphs'.

Grammaticalization of Japanese verbals

Kiyoharu Ono

Abstract: This paper is a comprehensive study of the grammaticalization of 18 Japanese lexical verbs and adjectives to auxiliaries and further to clitics from both diachronic and synchronic perspectives. Such auxiliaries follow the gerundive te form of main verbals and cliticization takes place as a result of phonetic assimilation. These two kinds of grammatical forms co-exist as layers in present day Japanese. We will first observe syntactic, semantic, pragmatic, and phonological changes that have occurred in the process of the grammaticalization of these lexical forms, together with the level of persistence that has been maintained. We will then attempt to account for these changes from the viewpoint of unidirectionality principles such as generalization of semantic content and syntactic decategorialization. Particular attention is given to such syntactic phenomena as animacy restriction, transitivity, and valency of the lexical and grammatical forms.

Last update: 1 May 2000
Comments to Tim Curnow